Reckoning
by Juliska
Summary: Just a fic about the cinematic "Reckoning" and aftermath from Zekhan's point of view. Complete spoilers for that cinematic and the Battle for Azeroth War Campaign. Cross-posted on AO3.


_**Author's Note: All characters, situations, locations, and everything else are copyright Blizzard Entertainment. No infringement intended and no profit has been made.**_

#

_"No one won the last war, and no one will win the next war." -Eleanor Roosevelt_

#

"Keep going!" Hekazi yelled in his son's ear, pushing him forward as they sprinted through the canyon. A half dozen Kor'kron guards were right behind them, a few on wolves.

Zekhan and his father had been stealing food, and the teenage troll was weighted down with the pack. He looked back - his eyes wide - at the soldiers. They would catch up within a minute at this pace, and they outnumbered he and his father three-to-one. They would stand little chance against the elite Kor'kron, and those Darkspear taken alive were usually impaled upon the spires of Orgrimmar.

"Change, Zekhan! We need ta hurry!" Hekazi said, gripping his spear and glancing back. His voice was mostly steady, likely more for the young troll's benefit than it was for him.

Zekhan closed his eyes quickly before being forced to open them again when he stumbled on a rock, nearly falling flat on his face. He gritted his teeth. "I can't, Papa. I can't hear dem!" he yelled back, a bit too loudly. It was getting harder and harder to hear the spirits with each new mission they went on.

Zekhan wasn't sure if it was because of something horribly wrong in Durotar, or if it was just his own fear.

"You have ta try!" Hekazi snapped back at him, causing the young troll to jump slightly. His father glanced at him with an apologetic look before looking up. A wide grin broke over his face. "Dere dey are! Up the slope, Zekhan!"

The young shaman turned around and looked up. On top of the slope were an orc and a blood elf - warrior and mage respectively, judging by their armor - and he nodded back at his father, starting to scramble up the cliff. Halfway up, he heard his father say behind him. "I'm proud of ya, Zekhan. I love ya."

It sounded far away, but that was probably just blood rushing through the shaman's ears as he climbed.

They had made it. The mage could teleport them back to the camp and they would be safe. Zekhan smiled as he thought about the food they had managed to find. He had even managed to get some candy for the children back at the camp. They had lost their homes and many had lost their families. It would make them so happy.

"Traitorous wretch!" an orcish voice boomed below him. They had caught up. He turned his head to see how far behind them they were and what he saw made him freeze.

Hekazi had never started up the slope. Instead, he stood near the middle of the canyon, his spear at the ready and surrounded by the soldiers who had been chasing them.

Zekhan gritted his teeth and dropped the sack on the path, then started sliding down. He had to help, and for the first time in weeks, he felt the crackle of lightning between his fingers.

He had almost reached the bottom of the path when he felt a large hand grip his arm. He spun around, ready to fire, when he saw the orc warrior holding him. "He's giving us time to get out!" the man hissed. "Come on! He knows what he's doing!"

"He's my papa!" Zekhan snapped, a bit too loudly again, and sent a slight shock through the orc's hand, causing him to hiss and let go so he could get down the cliff side.

The Kor'kron who had been speaking glanced over, then back at Hekazi. "Your whelp? Good. We need a new one for target practice," he laughed, then waved his hand. "Kill the old troll. Take the young one."

Hekazi glanced over at his son and snarled at the leader. "Cowards. I be fighting da Alliance and all da rest since you been at ya mama's knee. I take all of ya!"

The orc warrior who had been trying to drag Zekhan back pushed past him, his ax raised, obviously intent on joining the skirmish, when the sound of sprinting wolves came from down the canyon. Zekhan and the orc spun around to see another dozen Kor'kron coming.

They had been following them to find out where the rendezvous point was for the rebellion.

Zekhan felt the grip on his arm again, tighter this time, and the orc hissed in his ear. "We can't win! We have to go and warn the others not to come here! They'll have set a trap for any missions we send this way."

"I'm not leavin' him!" Zekhan said, looking back at his father. Hekazi had killed two of the orcs, but the other four were on him, one wrenching the spear from his grip while two others held him down.

The young troll tried to wrench his arm away, even tried to shock the orc again, but this time he was prepared and held fast, starting to painfully drag him back up the path to where the sin'dorei mage appeared to be simultaneously trying to raise a shield and cast a teleportation spell.

The leader of the Kor'kron, an ugly orc with a gray tint to his green skin, looked up at Zekhan, and he felt the rebel orc's grip tightened as he prepared to fight. The Kor'kron just smiled at him. "Look here, boy. See the price for treason."

He casually walked up at where Hekazi was pinned to the ground and raised his ax.

The last thing Zekhan saw before he felt the tug of the teleportation was the ax coming down.

#

Zekhan winced as he slammed his foot onto the rock outside the gates of Orgrimmar, but he righted himself in order to keep sprinting. He couldn't, he wouldn't let him face this alone.

Not now.

Not after last time.

He ran into something - an outstretched hand - and almost shoved it out of the way until he saw who it belonged to. Thrall - former Warchief of the Horde and one of the most powerful shamans to ever live - looked over at him. There was pain and sorrow etched on his face.

The orc's hand still smelled sweet from the anointing oil that he had smoothed over the blade of Saurfang's ax when they had been talking earlier. It had been the first thing that had tipped the young troll off as to what they were doing. Zekhan recognized it from his training as something he would be asked to do someday.

It was a great honor to be chosen as shaman for a challenger in a mak'gora.

He started to step forward again, but Thrall's heavy hand fell on his shoulder. It was not the tight grip of the orc warrior in the canyon. Instead, the mere presence drained Zekhan of the need to fight him.

"I'm sorry, but you have to let him do this," the orc muttered in his ear.

So, like the dutiful Horde soldier that he was, Zekhan watched in silence with all the rest of them.

The mak'gora was finished almost before it began. Within seconds, the old soldier was on his knees, Sylvanas stooped over him. Despite her banshee voice, Zekhan barely registered what she was saying. Something about hope. His eyes remained fixed on Saurfang and the black death that evaporated from his wounds like steam.

Why was he doing this? If he died, then they would have to fight the battle all the same, only without him to lead them.

Zekhan thought he saw Saurfang look up at him and stare into his eyes. Then the old orc spoke the first words that Zekhan had been cognizant of for the entire mak'gora.

"You cannot kill hope."

The warrior advanced, swinging the Alliance king's sword and, for the first time, drove Sylvanas back. Through the rush of voices from the spirits that were always in Zekhan's ears (and which had grown louder throughout the mak'gora), he heard him talk about the horror of Teldrassil, then the horror of Lordaeron. Finally, something he said cut through the thrum.

"The Horde will endure. The Horde is strong!"

She shoved him back, stopping his advance, when suddenly the one sword became two. The orc brought them down hard, one of them finally striking her face. It was the first time he had drawn blood the entire mak'gora.

Zekhan smiled momentarily until he heard the Banshee Queen's response, altogether louder than she probably intended.

"The Horde is _nothing_!" she hissed.

A stunned silence fell over the battlefield. The Forsaken woman who was Sylvanas's flagbearer flicked her golden eyes toward the Banshee Queen. It felt like the air had been sucked from the area in one moment.

Zekhan had known what Sylvanas thought since Lordaeron. It was still a gut-punch to hear her say it.

Sylvanas finally managed to compose herself, looking across the battlefield. Rage filled her face. "You are all _nothing_!" she screamed.

"That's it," Zekhan could barely hear Thrall mutter under his breath.

That's what Saurfang had wanted. What he was baiting her to admit.

Who would follow her now?

Zekhan looked up as he heard Saurfang start to roar and charge. "For Azer-"

His cry was cut off as a massive blast hit him square in the chest, then enveloped the area just in front of Thrall and Zekhan. When the black death cleared, Saurfang was lying motionless on the ground.

_No no no no. It can't be. It just can't be._

Zekhan tried to sprint out toward Saurfang, but Thrall's hand gripped his shoulder tightly. "It's too late. I'm sorry, it's too late," he was whispering to him, but Zekhan could barely hear him.

All he could hear was Sylvanas.

"If you could see yourselves as I see you," she said, her voice honeyed, stepping forward, her arms raised.

She turned her head back and forth, evidently surveying the assembled Horde and Alliance forces. "Toy soldiers in tin plate. Beasts who howl for honor. Standing as one."

The same black magic that had struck Saurfang down began to flow from her arms, and the voices in the young troll's ears screamed a warning at him. He tensed, ready to defend himself, but she acted as if she didn't even see him. Like he was not important enough for her to pay attention to.

"Savor it . . . Nothing lasts," she said simply, and disintegrated before his eyes, before the black mist shot through the Durotar sky.

An instant later, Thrall let his shoulder go, and he sprinted, sliding down next to Saurfang and raising his hands, starting to call on the water spirits to heal him but . . . they didn't obey.

The spirit of water was wise, and knew not to waste her energy on the dead.

He did not immediately notice Thrall and the Alliance king come up behind him, and they kept back a few feet. He dumbly reached for the pendant around Saurfang's neck - the one the old orc had tried to burn in guilt and grief and that Zekhan had singed his hands trying to save to save the orc himself.

The scorch marks were still there, but the Horde symbol had been polished as well as could be expected.

"What do we do now?" he whispered, more to himself than anyone else.

"We bring him home," Thrall said gently, kneeling down beside him.

It took Zekhan a few moments to realize what he meant, until the Alliance king knelt down as well. His face was solemn and . . . sorrowful?

Zekhan had heard a story, back when he was a boy, about Saurfang's own son and how the Alliance had ended up being the ones who had brought him down in the end, after he had been raised as a death knight - a slave of the Lich King. He had heard about how - in a moment of incredible kindness and mercy - King Varian - this boy's father - had called off his forces to let the High Overlord retrieve the body of his son.

King Anduin was little older than Zekhan. He had evidently already learned as much as his father.

The three of them were able to lift the body of the fallen orc, only to be faced with the Forsaken woman at the gates. She stared at them, and they stared back. Zekhan felt his heart begin to drop.

After all this, was it possible that the battle would continue anyway?

_Tink tink._

The woman wordlessly tapped her flag on the hard Durotar ground. A moment later, the massive gates began to open. The mask made it impossible to read her facial expression. Not that the Forsaken usually had very expressive faces anyway. Still, she glanced at them as they walked past, not moving from her spot.

As they entered the gates, there was an echoing sound on the iron ramparts. _Tink tink. Tink tink. Tink tink._

A wordless salute to a fallen warrior.

#

Zekhan slowly stood after kneeling before the pyre. They would be lighting it soon, and he wanted to say his goodbyes first.

The funeral had been a bit of a blur. He had been given the horn for the call to honor, but he could barely remember sounding it. Thrall and Anduin had both spoken, but he could barely remember what was said.

He walked over and stared down at Saurfang. His body bore the scars of Sylvanas's blades, although his body had been left largely undamaged by the massive blast that had ended his life. He reached down and squeezed the now cold hand of someone he had admired for as long as he could remember.

He must have stood there long enough to attract attention, because the next thing he knew, a voice spoke behind him. "Do not mourn him long, shaman. He is with his mate and son once again."

Zekhan turned his head to see Thrall standing there, a few feet away. He turned back around and stared down at the body again.

Zekhan felt anger bubble up inside of him as he stood there, not knowing what to say or do. Saurfang was with his family again, his real family, and he knew he should be happy for that, but he just couldn't be. Sylvanas was still out there, and Saurfang was gone forever.

_What kind of honor and justice is there in that?_ Zekhan wanted to ask the spirits, but he knew there would be no answer. There wasn't one the last time.

Knowing he would get no answer from them, he looked blearily over his shoulder at Thrall, who seemed to be patiently waiting. "What do we do now?" he repeated softly.

The older shaman frowned at him and walked up, placing a hand on his shoulder again. "We live, and we make his sacrifice worth the cost," he said simply.

Zekhan sighed and shook the hand from his shoulder, ignoring the sigh Thrall gave him in return. He knew he should wait until the pyre was over, but he didn't think he could bring himself to watch. He had seen enough people burn in the war to make him never want to call upon fire ever again.

He walked past the crowds and headed toward the Drag. He could hear the crackle and rush of fire behind him as the pyre was lit, but he did not look back.

The Drag slowly began to fill with people as soldiers and civilians filed away from the funeral. None of them paid him any mind. He was just another young soldier who had finally come home from war.

"Who was that orc?" a little voice was asking up ahead, and Zekhan recognized the small building as the Orgrimmar Orphanage. He had visited once or twice, showing the children his skills with lightning to their great delight.

The show never got old, since it seemed each new time he arrived, there were sadly new children.

"Who?" another little voice asked.

"The dead one at the funeral."

"Matron said it was Lord Saurfang."

There was silence, then another young child said in a voice barely above a whisper. "That's so sad. He was nice to us. He brought us toys last Winter Veil."

Zekhan paused and stood in the doorway. Inside, he saw two orclings - a boy and a girl - and a little blood elf girl standing in a circle. They looked so sad, and Zekhan frowned until he heard the orc girl speak up. "What happened to him?"

"I guess he got killed in the war," the orc boy said solemnly.

They stood there in silence again, before the little elf spoke, her golden glowing eyes narrowing and her forehead wrinkling. "Where was the Warchief? She wasn't at the funeral."

"I don't think she and the High Overlord liked each other," the boy said simply, crossing his arms.

The little elf scowled at him. "That doesn't matter. She's 'sposed to take care of us."

_She's supposed to take care of us._

Zekhan swallowed, forcing down the sorrow in his chest, before stepping inside. "Hi," he said shakily, and the children looked over at him.

The sadness on their faces evaporated and they smiled at him, rushing over. "Show us the tricks! Show us!"

Evidently these children had been in the orphanage for awhile. He forced a smile and strung lightning between his hands, making it bounce up and down for a few seconds before letting it dissipate. They giggled, obviously forgetting their somber conversation from just seconds earlier.

He stared down at them, then motioned for them to follow him outside for a moment. Once there, he crouched down off of the path and drew in the dirt with his finger for a few seconds before looking back up. "Ya three were talkin' 'bout Lord Saurfang," he said gently.

They nodded. "Did you know him?" the boy asked.

He smiled and swallowed, looking up again. "Let me tell ya a story…"


End file.
